Silver Arrow
by NoMore1970
Summary: When hurt in battle, Thalia unveils a shocking new prophecy that could mean extinction of the Huntresses, and the death of someone crucial to Thalia's life. Switching perspectives from Thalia to Aubrey, my new character
1. Thalia

Devastation can happen when you least expect it. Though most are oblivious to the occurrence that lingers ahead, someone, maybe only a solitary soul, but someone nevertheless always knows. When tragedy struck Artemis' hunters, it was done completely in the dark, as if we'd been lingering in a pitch black night, unable to see the truth.

The temperature is glacial. A dull numbness was seeping through the exterior of my boots, the color of the crescent moon itself, and into my toes. The force of a sheer breeze sends chilling vibrations down my spine and crystalizes my lips, turning them a sickly shade of lavender. Slender icy fingers clutch at my heart, attempting to puncture it to allow the cold to freeze it, too. As I blow a strand of my choppy, ash colored bangs away, I reach for my bow. An immense buck wanders the premises of the woods, weaving quaintly in an out of the trees as it goes. I pull back my bow and squint through one eye, waiting for the opportune moment to release my grip and impale the buck straight through the eyes. His beady black pupils stare at me from the distance. I take this miniscule hesitation of his to my advantage and released my hold. The arrow spirals through the air and hits him almost where I wanted, slightly misaligned due to his delayed reaction of sprinting at the last second. I jostle after the collapsed carcass of the animal, bow in hand, ready to heft the game back to Artemis.

When I get back to headquarters, a circle of shimmery tents set up in the form of the Greek omega, which if you ask me is audacious to call headquarters, Artemis has scrawled out a brief note that reads:

_Gone out hunting. Be back shortly. _

Thinking nothing of it, I dump the buck face-first next to the entrance of her tent, feeling content that Artemis would have a pleasant surprise when she returned. Upon barricading myself in blankets back at my tent, with a cracked and weathered terracotta mug filled to the brim with coffee, a bloodcurdling scream pierces the air. I jump, sloshing coffee all over my jacket. I curse in ancient Greek.

"Just great, now my boobs will smell like hazelnut," I murmured under my breath. I vacated the tent, and inhaled sharply, filling my nostrils with the crisp, clean scent of snow. A few feet into the woods, lies Kambia, a tall, thin Huntress known for her good aim, sprawled out like a corpse. Her hair, a rich honeycomb color, is spread out in a tangled mess, encircling her head like a halo. Her once tan complexion is white as a sheet. Her lips are cracked and bloody, and in the middle of her chest is a deep hole, carved out by a knife.

"Who did this to you?" I breathe wispily.

"Prometheus… has an army. He stabbed me. Run. Warn the others." She whispers hoarsely. I watch helplessly as her eyes went lifeless, and then I run. I bolt past the trees, tripping over the underbrush, the snow and my own two feet as my puppet limbs obey the single command given to me from Kambia. Run.

Suddenly, I feel the grip of a firm hand, sturdy as iron, deeming me motionless. I hear the distinct sound of a dagger being unsheathed. An abysmal voice rings in the silence of the woods.

"Sweet dreams," it hisses, and I shriek as I feel my side being gouged with a knife. I double over in pain clutching my sides. The sturdy fist, or maybe a boulder, I'm not quite sure, slams into my head, and the whole world blurs around me. I hear the Huntresses' battle cry as they engage in war around me. Dead bodies of Huntresses, hellhounds, and hyperboreans fall to the floor. And here I sit, a miserable little pygmy, defenseless. I try to stand, but instead, I am knocked out cold with a wooden club. Not dazed this time, unconscious.

Behind a wall of smoke and flame, death and destruction, blood and gore, I lay, descending into a deep sleep, accelerating into the abyss with every breath.

I awake in the Huntresses' infirmary. I've only been there once before, when a girl, Alana, had gotten fatally injured in a freak attack with a drakon in a period of Artemis' truancy. It was a tent similar to the ones in which we slept, only larger. Velvet pillows differing in shades of silver cascaded from a silky rucksack, carpeting the floor. Metallic baskets overflow with an assortment of ointment capsules, and antidotes. I try to roll myself up into a sitting position, but a screaming pain as noticeable as an emergency alarm shoots up my left side. I gasp in agony and lie back down to examine the injury. I twist sideways, crying out with the effort. Peering at the nasty gash, I realize just how horrific it is. Blood rushes furiously like raging rapids from the throbbing wound. The nearest pillow is submerged in my blood. It requires every ounce of my energy to cover the spout with my hands from which a scarlet waterfall emerges and apply pressure to slow the blood flow.

To my relief, Artemis burst through the entrance to infirmary.

"Are you alright?" She gasps genuinely. It sounded as if she had only inquired perfunctorily, but I know she was merely gulping for air because she had just come from a deadly battle scene. Though Artemis puts all of her Huntresses before anything else, my well- being was the least of my concerns.

"Did you kill them?" I demanded.

"Every last one. Now let's see that impale of yours, shall we? " She lamented in reply. Reluctantly, I hoist up my hunting jacket and unveil the grotesque slash engraved in my skin.

"Gods, Thal." She began. "That's no insignificant matter." Artemis hesitated, as if what she were about to say next pained her deeply. I projected her thought aloud, "I'm still fighting tomorrow."

"I can't let you do that." She recanted my statement solemnly. I set my jaw and contradict her wordlessly, purely by the expression I wear. Returning the silence, she selects a bandage from one of the thinly wired baskets and starts wrapping my lower torso, where the wound remains. I wince, grinding my teeth to resist the wild urge to scream. She bandages me in three layers, like a decrepit and corroded millennium old mummy.

Suddenly, an arrow with a scroll fastened to it floated gently down into the infirmary. Artemis froze upon seeing it, her icy blue irises swelling with anticipation.

"What is that?" I demand. I've never seen Artemis look so grieved in my life. Artemis says nothing; she only unravels the scroll and hands it to me, her face unmoving, as if it was a stone engraving. Taking the scroll in my hands, I begin to read:

_Warrior maiden of the bow_

_Olympus perish or overthrow_

_Three beholders of the blade_

_In their hands a fate is placed_

_Sacred covenant shall not last_

_Bury three half-bloods in the past_

I examined the prophecy over and over in sheer horror.

"Artemis?" I inquired shakily "You have a daughter, don't you?" I accused, aware of the tremor in my voice. All the goddess of the hunt could reply back with was a miserable little nod.

**TO BE CONTINUED**


	2. Aubrey

Eccentric. That was the word the majority of the students enrolled at Brigton Hills Academy used to describe me.

"Why?" I'd retort, curious to acquire the information as to why they found me so queer. The answers were always exceedingly similar. Some would elaborate excessively to explain their accusations. Others muttered fragments to themselves and made the sign against evil upon crossing me in the hallway. They said my electrifying blue eyes, brimmed with silver, looked otherworldly, alien-like. Some were petrified by my seldom meaningless dreams. Usually, my dreams allowed me to predict the future, or see into other's dreams, like an empathy link. They saw fit to torment me regarding my vague recollection of the mother I never knew, and even fainter visions of a silver chariot, the moon, and gory battle scenes. I draw these things often, accompanied other out of the ordinary things and fore-sights I witness in my slumber. In addition, I see things that you would only rest your gaze upon in a Greek mythology pamphlet, or a storybook, things that every ordinary person mistakes for an everyday object. Now I realize, I'm not eccentric, just special, if that's the way you prefer to look at it. Actually, the term I'd use is legendary.

I saunter through the hallways of Brighton Hills Academy, willing myself to dissolve into the crowd. As I make my way to calculus, I try to reform the image from my dream that had dissolved from my brain earlier, diminishing itself. I can't quite make out all the details, but I have a slight impression of the engraving that had vacated my brain before.

"Aubrey!" a voice behind me shrieks. I spin around to find my best, not to mention only, friend, Lacey.

"Is there something urgent enough that warrants petrifying your best friend to death?" I whirl around incredulously.

"Yes." Her face goes dark with serene seriousness. "I didn't inform you of this before, because… well, you'd think I belong in an insane asylum." I blink my eyes a few times and cock my head to the side, flummoxed. Lacey exhales.

"Never mind, maybe my anticipations were inaccurate…" She walks off, murmuring things under her breath. Sometimes she can be like that, mysterious, as if she were living in a complete different fantasy realm. It doesn't irritate me however, I'm just ecstatic to have a dependable friend.

My train of thought is interrupted with a rude awakening by the deafening alarm, indicating I'm officially late to class. I let out an exasperated sigh, and accelerate my walking pace.

"Late yet again, Miss Topen." Mrs. Machirio lectures me through clenched teeth, apparently oblivious to the daggers shooting from her eyes. Her toffee colored hair spills over her shoulders, cascading down her back like Niagara Falls. Hazel irises stare me in the face intensely.

"Sorry." I mumble an apology, finding my way to my desk to escape her look of complete and utter hatred. The sound of her five inch heels click on the floor as she precedes to my seat to hand me a tardy slip. Sometimes, I think somebody needs to explain to Mrs. Machirio that this is a classroom, in a high school. Not a runway at a fashion show. I think it ironic that her assistant, Mr. Catalon, is the complete opposite of her, in his dreary grey suit and thin wire rimmed glasses. I sit while they drone on about various equations, boring me to death.

The distinct smell of smoke wafts up to my nostrils, pulling me out of my coma of boredom. I whip my head around, strands of my coffee bean colored hair flying, to find an immense cloud of smoke billowing in through the ajar window. A wooden mallet appears in the window and cleaves down hard, shattering the glass barrier, sending shards of the window everywhere. Screams rise up everywhere, and a massive blue, fluorescent _blue_, fist reaches through the opening it created, followed by a horrifically ugly bald head, a matching color. His beady eyes are solid black, accompanied by a smashed in nose, which is surrounded by warts. He has a miniscule shriveled mouth, with crooked teeth, in an assortment of shades of greens, yellows, and browns. Tattoos cover his exceedingly large biceps, with various illustrations and sayings, including _Mama's boy_, _I heart snuggles_, and _Bad to the bone_. I watch in sheer horror as the revolting creature hefts himself through the space, obliterating the frame that previously encased the window in the process.

"Aubrey, run!" Lacey screams hysterically. I look around, wild eyed, and spot Lacey screeching helplessly at one of the malicious creatures to let her go. I rack my brain desperately for something I can do to help her. I cannot and will not leave her. I can only think of one thing.

"Over here, you potbellied, rum soaked ogre!" I scream audaciously. The monster lumbers towards me, smirking viciously. A flaming orb of fire materializes in his hand as he hefts back his arm to volley it at me. I unhook the fire extinguisher from its latch on the wall and spray him with a stream of white foam, which kills the ignited fireball. He removes a wooden club from his rugged tasseled sash, but is overcome by a spiraling vine of leaves, entwining themselves around him, declaring him a prisoner to their cage of plants. Behind him, Lacey stands proudly, tendrils of vine emitting from her hand. Everything about her is the same, minus her once auburn hair, which is blown by an invisible breeze and is shamrock green. I stood there, frozen, jaw gaping.

"I'll explain later," She stated breathlessly. "We've got to go; there'll be more of them coming." I don't object. Instead, I trail her wordlessly to her ancient jeep, which is on its last leg. Once inside the vehicle, I ask, stunned, "What was that thing? And more importantly, what are you?!" I inquire it expectantly, as if she were required to know this information.

"You just encountered your first monster from Greek mythology, a _hyperborean_. As for me, I am a dryad, commonly known as a maiden of a tree. You, my dear, are a demigod, or a half-blood." She smirks.

"Wait, you're telling me our obsessions with Greek mythology books…you knew they were real, all along?" I demand.

"Yeah." She winces. I storm off, incapable of comprehending that my friend, whom I trusted so deeply, betrayed me, held back information that was vital, crucial, to the my very existence! I can hear her pleas to me to come back, but I don't listen.


End file.
